


Together Clinging

by dwarrowdams



Series: Eadgar Lives AU [2]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Disability, Family, Family Feels, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-12
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:07:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26431639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dwarrowdams/pseuds/dwarrowdams
Summary: Eadgar comes up with a plan to help his sister after the loss of her arm.  Set about three weeks after "When Eadgyd Remained Bold."
Series: Eadgar Lives AU [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1913467
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	Together Clinging

**Author's Note:**

> I'd planned to get right into Eadgyd and Eadgar joining the party, but I am weak and cannot turn down an opportunity to write family togetherness.
> 
> It's also another chance to talk disability in Middle-earth, which is something that's important to me (and a thing I've spent a lot of time thinking about since I created Eadgyd). This certainly won't be the last disability-related piece in this series (I have at least two more in progress, maybe more because aside from having different documents for different series, I have no system or organizing my writing).

Eadgar hated his damned broken legs.

He was fortunate enough to have a wheeled chair that his father—and later, Hild—had used after sustaining injuries, but he couldn’t get into it without some assistance. His mother had moved his bed into the main hall to make it easier to move about—and to call for assistance when necessary—but it was still early and Eadgar didn’t want to wake anyone.

However, he’d heard soft voices in the kitchen a few minutes ago, so it seemed that someone was awake. “Hello?” he called hesitantly. “Is anyone there?” 

A moment later, Frida poked her head into the room. “You’re up early,” she said. “What do you need?”

“Could you help me into the chair?” he asked. “I want to talk to everyone before Eadgyd wakes.”

“Of course,” Frida replied. She wheeled the chair beside his bed and helped Eadgar slide into it. Before heading towards the kitchen, he grabbed a wooden box from his bedside table and set it on his lap.

Frida eyed it curiously. “What’s in there?” she asked.

“You’ll find out in a minute,” he said as she wheeled him into the kitchen, leaving his chair beside the table.

Swithun and Hild were already there, conversing as they drank their morning cups of tea. “Morning, dear,” Swithun said to Eadgar. “Did you sleep all right?”

Eadgar shrugged. The nightmares had died down, but the pain in his knees sometimes kept him up. “As well as can be expected,” he said. “Is Avina still sleeping?”

“Of course she is,” Hild said. “The sun’s barely up, so she won’t be for a few more hours.”

“Can you get her?” he said. “There’s something I want us to discuss, and it’s rather important that she’s here.”

Hild sighed as she got up from her chair. “Fine,” she said, “but you’re taking the blame for it.”

Eadgar shrugged. “Fair enough.”

“It’s your funeral,” Hild muttered as she headed for the bedroom.

“Would you like some tea?” Swithun asked. “It’s chamomile, peppermint, and rose hip—and quite lovely with a bit of honey.”

“Sure,” Eadgar said. He enjoyed a good cup of tea, but found that certain kinds made him restless. Thankfully, the family’s herb garden made it easy to experiment with different blends, so Eadgar hadn’t had to give it up completely.

“Want me to get it?” Frida offered.

“Yes, but don’t fill it so full,” Eadgar said. “I don’t need burns on top of everything else.”

Frida laughed softly as she filled a mug with tea, placing it before her brother before sitting beside him. “There—plenty of room,” she said.

“Excellent,” Eadgar said as he stirred some honey into his tea. “The best part of waking up.”

Before he could take a sip, Hild returned to the kitchen with Avina staggering behind her. Avina grimaced at Eadgar as she pushed her hair out of her face. “This had better be important,” she said as she plunked into one of the remaining chairs.

“It is,” Eadgar said. “It’s about Eadgyd.”

That got everyone’s attention. Since the battle, Eadgyd had barely left her bed, spending most of her waking hours weeping or staring blankly at the wall. She’d barely spoken a word to any of them—not even Eadgar, and the two ordinarily told each other anything. The whole household felt the weight of her sorrow and Eadgar meant to do something to alleviate it.

He set the wooden box on the table and opened it, revealing at least thirty silvers and a couple of gold pieces. “I want to buy Eadgyd a prosthetic,” he said. “She hasn’t just lost her arm: she’s lost part of who she is as a warrior, and although she can learn to fight again, it will never be the same. I know it will take months—perhaps more than a year—to save enough coin, but I’d do it if I had to eat nothing but bread-crusts and drink nothing but water for the rest of my life.”

He paused, blinking away the tears forming at the corners of his eyes. “I know that I’ve been a burden these past weeks, but I hope that you’ll agree to help in whatever way you can: not for me, but for Eadgyd.”

Swithun reached across the table to squeeze his hand. “My son, you could break every bone in your body and you would be no burden,” she said. “Of course we’ll help.”

Frida, Avina, and Hild all nodded.

Eadgar sighed in relief. “Thank goodness,” he said. “I’m not sure what something like that would cost, but I imagine it would take quite some time to save all by myself.”

“Years, at least, depending on how much you worked, and that’s for the work of a less experienced smith,” Hild said. “But you won’t be working alone, so we may be able to save enough within a year, unless you have an exceedingly complicated design in mind.”

“I figured I’d leave the design to you—you know far more than I of what a smith could do.”

Hild nodded. “That I can do,” she said. “I don’t have the tools or the skill to craft it myself, but I’ve seen such things before and have a sense of how they’re made. If I took a design to the dwarves, I’m sure they could make it.”

“Perfect,” Eadgar said. “I’m not sure how long it’ll be before I’m well enough to travel, but until then, I have some macrame pieces that I can sell and plenty of yarn to make some more.”

“Your father and I saved a bit of money for times such as these,” Swithun said. “Aside from that, I’ll take what work I can find among our people.”

“We might also ask others if they can give,” Frida suggested. “I’m sure there are more than a few people who’d be happy to give a bit of coin to help Eadgyd.”

Avina nodded. “And if we have no luck selling here, the anniversary of the Battle of Five Armies is coming up, is it not?” she asked. “If so, perhaps Hild and I could go and sell our wares.”

“It is,” Hild said. “Even if there’s not room for us to have our own stall, I know one of the local blacksmiths, and I’m sure they could be persuaded to let us sell our goods alongside theirs.”

Eadgar breathed a sigh of relief before taking a sip of his tea. He’d been worried about the logistics of it all—those damned pesky things got in the way of all of his best ideas—but his family’s reaction made his impossible dream seem a bit more possible.

“Oh, and one more thing before I forget,” Eadgar said. “Don’t tell Eadgyd. She’d just tell us to use the money for something else.”

Everyone else at the table nodded. Even in her moments of greatest need, Eadgyd was a proud woman, and would not accept help when she thought it could do more good elsewhere.

“Then it’s settled,” Frida said. “We’re all going to help.”

“Thank you,” Eadgar replied, his shoulders slumping in relief. “I would’ve done it myself if I had to, but it’ll be much easier with your help.”

“We’d never abandon you, certainly not in your time of greatest need,” Swithun said. “We are family, and no matter what storms we shall face, we will weather them together. I would travel into the fires of Mordor if it meant that any one of you would have a chance at a better life.”

“Well, hopefully the furthest we’ll have to go is Dale,” Eadgar teased.

Avina snickered in spite of her exhaustion. “Good to know it’s only your knees that are broken, not your sense of humor.”

Eadgar grinned. “The Uruk would’ve had to hit me a lot harder to break that,” he said.

“And let’s be grateful it didn’t,” Hild said as she took up her mug. “Shall we toast?”

Everyone murmured their assent, picking up their mugs.

“To success in our quest to aid Eadgyd, and to Eadgar the Sharp, who has lost none of his sharpness,” Hild said.

Everyone clinked their mugs together before taking sips of tea, the mood at the table suddenly hopeful. Despite the situation before them—and the healing he still had to do—Eadgar felt hope warm his chest. He might have faced more than his share of evils, but their darkness paled in comparison to the warmth and light that his family offered.

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, what must it be like to have a family that is unconditionally supportive?
> 
> (mostly a rhetorical question, but if you want to tell me, then go for it)
> 
> There's going to be one (or maybe two?) more pieces before Eadgar and Eadgyd join the party! I've officially gotten the clear from my fellow players to use their characters, so we're all locked and loaded for future chapters. While Eadgar and Eadgyd will be the primary focus, I'm excited to see how they interact with the other characters from campaign
> 
> Please comment if you enjoyed this! Even if I don't reply to them, your comments mean so much to me and have gotten me through some rough spots. I kind of had some bad experiences as a fic writer in the Tolkien fandom years ago (it's been twelve years and I still remember some of the comments I got on those, which like...yeah, my writing probably sucked, but also I was fifteen and had literally never shared my writing in a public forum before, so maybe ease up a bit???).
> 
> Anyways, thanks for the comments and kudos on this and my other Eadgyd stuff. It means a lot. <3
> 
> Tumblr: dwarrowdams  
> Twitter: @_tenderqueer


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